phenomenology

Husserl’s philosophy

Husserl → the world only makes sense cuz we impose meaning and order on it by constructing mental categories that we use to classify and 'file' info coming from our senses. e.g. a category such as ‘four-legged furniture for eating off' enables us to identify a particular set of sensory data as 'table'.

In this view, we can only obtain knowledge about the world through our mental acts of categorising and giving meaning to our experiences. The world as we know it is, and can only be, a product of our mind.

Schutz’s phenomenological sociology

Schutz (1899-1959) applies this idea to the social world. He argues that the categories and concepts we use are not unique to ourselves - rather, we share them with other members of society.

typifications and the natural attitude

Schutz’s phenomenological sociology - typifications

Schutz calls these shared categories typifications. Typifications enable us to organise our experiences into a shared world of meaning.

the meaning of any given experience varies according to its social context. e.g. raising your arm means one thing in class and quite another at an auction. The meaning isn’t given by the action in itself, but by its context. thus, meanings are potentially unclear and unstable - especially if others classify the action in a different way from oneself.

typifications stabilise and clarify meanings by ensuring that we are all 'speaking the same language' - all agreeing on the meaning of things. This makes it possible for us to communicate and cooperate with one another and thus to achieve our goals. Without shared typifications, social order would become impossible.

members of society to a large extent do have a shared 'life world' - a stock of shared typifications or commonsense knowledge that we use to make sense of our experience. It includes shared assumptions about the way things are, what certain situations mean, what other people's motivations are, etc. Schutz calls this 'recipe knowledge': like a recipe, we can follow it without thinking too much, and still get the desired results in everyday life. e.g. we all 'know' that a red light means stop or danger and this knowledge enables us to drive safely.

This commonsense knowledge isn’t simply knowledge about the world - it is the world. for Husserl the world as we know it can only be a product of our mind. Similarly, for Schutz the social world is a shared, inter-subjective world that can only exist when we share the same meanings. e.g. a red traffic light only 'means' stop cuz we all agree that it does.

Schutz’s phenomenological sociology - the natural attitude

society appears to us as a real, objective thing existing outside of us. To illustrate this, Schutz gives the example of posting a letter to a bookshop to order a book. In doing so, he says, we assume that some unknown and unseen individuals (postal workers, a bookshop owner) will perform a whole series of operations in a particular sequence - and that all this will result in our receiving the book.

The fact that we do get the book encourages us to adopt what he calls 'the natural attitude' - it leads us to assume that the social world is a solid, natural thing out there. but, it shows that all those involved (the book buyer and seller, the postal workers) share the same meanings, and this allows us to cooperate and achieve goals.

AO3 - limitation of the natural attitude

Berger and Luckmann (1971) → while Schutz is right to focus on shared commonsense knowledge, they reject his view that society is merely an inter-subjective reality.

Although reality is socially constructed, as Schutz believes, once it has been constructed, it takes on a life of its own and becomes an external reality that reacts back on us.

e.g. religious ideas may start off in our consciousness, but they become embodied in powerful structures such as churches, which then constrain us - for example, by influencing laws about our sexual relationships.